Driving

The track plan is where you drive your trains: by hand with the throttle, in Interlocking mode, where LoDi-Aura sets the routes and you drive, or fully automatically. This page explains the three driving modes, the drag gestures, the train menu, the buttons for starting and stopping, switching in operation and the safety settings.

The three driving modes

Every train has exactly one driving mode. You will find the three buttons in the train menu above the compass: click the block the train is standing in. The buttons only appear when the layout is switched on; the selected mode has a frame around it.

The mode belongs to LoDi-Aura: the button only sends your intention, and what is displayed is what LoDi-Aura reports back.

A badge on the train shows its state: A green = running or looking for destinations, A grey = only armed, S = Interlocking. Taking hold of the handheld throttle always takes priority.

Where the automation drives to

The automation only drives where it can get out again. A train in “🔄 Auto” does not choose a track it could not leave again with its train class, against one-way blocks and without permission to reverse – nor a “pocket” of several blocks that together lead nowhere. A locked track means “don't go here”: the train takes the next destination straight away instead of waiting. Trains only reverse in a station or on a dead-end track, never against the one-way direction of their own track.

If a train does get stuck, the log reports “stuck” and names the blocks of the pocket. Waiting won't help then – only driving it out by hand or adding another exit to the track plan.

Sending a train off

Everything starts with the same move: pick up the standing train and drag it onto the destination block. The preview line is green if there is a clear way and red if there is none – or if STOP is holding or there is no power; the reason is then shown at the pointer. Which modifier key you hold decides what kind of run it becomes:

The keys also work if you press them in the middle of dragging – the preview then asks again. If the way is only possible by reversing, the preview already announces the zigzag run.

The same gestures apply when you drag the loco picture from the throttle or from the “Trains” window onto a block in the track plan.

Other ways to move a train

Open the “Trains” window with “Trains ⧉” next to the booster and feedback buttons. For each train it shows the three modes, the aspect at the block end and the distance to the signal (→🚦) or, where there is no signal, to the stopping point (→🏁). Below that is a strip with the blocks ahead. More about the windows in The interface.

When LoDi-Aura refuses the departure

As long as STOP is holding or there is no power on the way, LoDi-Aura does not accept any new driving command – not even “for later”. Otherwise the train would set off as soon as you released STOP, and you would long have forgotten the command.

What LoDi-Aura doesn't know doesn't block anything. Only your commands are refused: an automation that was already under way pauses during STOP and carries on afterwards. Sequences, the turntable and “⏭ Advance” are not affected. When you release STOP or the power comes back, an open train menu fetches the arrows again by itself.

The train menu

Clicking a block with a train in it opens the train's menu. What you need often is at the top, what you need rarely is at the bottom.

The menu has a handle (⠿) at the top. Use it to drag the menu aside with the mouse or your finger so that the train underneath stays visible. It stays there until you close it.

Direction of travel and handheld throttle

Below the train name, the loco is shown as on the LoDi-Con: ◀ loco picture ▶. The bright arrow is the direction the loco is travelling in: ▶ green = forward, ◀ red = reverse. This means the loco's direction of travel, not left or right on the screen.

• Clicking the pale arrow sends speed step 0 with the opposite direction to every loco in the train. The train stays where it is and keeps facing the same way – only its exit changes to the other end of the block. The log records it.
• Clicking the loco picture opens the handheld throttle for this loco.

The arrows are locked while the train is moving or holding a route, and when the layout is off. The tooltip says so (“— stop first” or “— layout is off”). You can still always see the current state.

Below the loco picture is a small speed slider for shunting: fine on the left, coarse on the right, stop at the far left. It appears when the layout is switched on and can be moved in “✋ Manual” and “🚦 Interlocking”.

Position on the track and tools

If you are looking for a train in the track plan, “🎯” in the “Trains ⧉” window finds it: the track plan comes to the front, centres the loco and briefly highlights it – even in a different layout part.

“🔃 Turn” and “📥 Depot” are only available when the train is safely stopped – not moving and not holding a route. “🏠 Home” disappears while it is moving. If a button is missing, press STOP first.

On a block without a train, the menu offers “⇱ Take over …” if the feedback sensor is occupied and RailCom is reading the loco of a train there that, according to the plan, is standing somewhere else. The train is moved here – without a driving command. If it is not offered, the menu gives the reason (“not offered: …”).

Stopping

The buttons in the track plan toolbar

The toolbar above the track plan holds the buttons for the whole layout. Green is the way into operation, red the way out.

Stop operation

The menu on the red button lists the ways of bringing the layout to a standstill, from gentle to hard:

With the pin (📍/📌) next to an entry, you set what the first press on “🛑 STOP” does. It can't be Go home: that doesn't set the stopped state, so a second press would not give an emergency stop.

Tools

To release a route that is stuck, use STOP or ✋ in the train menu, one train at a time.

Switching in operation

Pushpins: notes in the track plan

1. Choose the pinIn operation, click “🧰 Tools ▾” › “📌 Pushpin”.
2. Place itThe next click places a note pin on a turnout, a block, a track – or anywhere in the plan.
3. Write a noteWrite down what you noticed, for example “it always judders here”.

Clicking an existing pin opens its note. Pins marked as “done” don't disappear but stay in the history; for each spot, LoDi-Aura counts how often something has been noted there. Open pins are listed in the log under “Maintenance” (see Log and diagnostics).

What the track plan shows

LoDi-Aura never turns a placed train by itself. RailCom reports what it sees, but doesn't change how you placed the train – unless you have switched on “Relocate by RailCom” (see “Safety”): then a train follows its number into another block and picks up the direction there afresh. If a train is the wrong way round in the picture, turn it with “🔃 Turn”. The ◀ ▶ arrows won't help here: they only change the loco's direction of travel.

Reversing loops

LoDi-Aura plans and drives routes through reversing loops, but doesn't switch anything electrically – the polarity is changed by a separate reversing loop module on the layout. Returning to the train's own starting block only works if the train length is known and the loop is longer than the train. You can't drag the train's own block as a single destination: it works as a waypoint with Shift, or you choose a destination beyond the loop. In “🔄 Auto”, LoDi-Aura does not extend the run back through the loop; the train stops at the end of the booked route and then looks for a new destination.

Safety

You will find the safety settings under “System” › “Track plan” in the “RailCom”, “Protection”, “Automation” and “Program start” cards. Switches marked “Administrator” can only be changed by whoever administers the layout (see Settings).

The fields apply to all trains on the layout and are saved in the project.

Whatever the RC guard finds is recorded in the log – as an error if a train was stopped, otherwise as a warning. The block or turnout shows “⚠ RC” or “⚠ STOP” for 90 seconds.

What always applies

• Speed steps don't survive a restart. As soon as the layout goes online after starting, every loco of a placed train gets speed step 0 (see Installing and starting). A train must not carry on by itself after a restart.
• Speed step 0 before every switch-on. Not just the main “Layout” switch: GO in the throttle, GO on a command station in the booster window and the first main-track booster on the LoDi-Rektor also set that command station's placed locos to speed step 0 first. Otherwise locos would set off at their last saved speed step when power comes on. If a STOP or an emergency off happens in the meantime, nothing is switched on; the log names the command station.
• Movement only with track power on. Without a booster, the automation doesn't drive either, and LoDi-Aura refuses a new driving command and gives the reason.
• Driving and all guards run in the program on the layout computer. Closing an interface window doesn't stop any train. If the program crashes, a layout on the LoDi-Rektor loses power within about two seconds because its watchdog stops getting a signal. LoDi-Aura does not maintain such a watchdog on the Z21, ECoS and Märklin® CS3 – what happens there in a crash is up to the command station.
• Dead man's switch: if the automation stands still for more than three seconds while the layout is online, LoDi-Aura switches off track power on all command stations and sets ALL STOP. The log names every command station that could not be switched off. After that, nothing starts up again by itself.
• Cycle watchdog: if the automation's cycle drops out for half a second, a warning appears in the log. After one second, every placed loco gets an emergency stop, and ALL STOP applies until you release it; track power stays on.